Republicans Are Going All Out to Force Yet Another Terrible Obamacare Repeal Bill

After multiple failed attempts to kill the incredibly popular law given to us by an incredibly popular former president, you'd think Republicans would know better than to put all of their efforts into rushing through a bad piece of legislation that will have a real and terrible effect on the lives of millions of Americans, and yet here we are once again. This time the offending piece of legislation is called Graham-Cassidy after its sponsors, Lindsay "I'm deeply disturbed by what Donald Trump has said, oh, but yeah, I'll definitely vote for whatever he wants" Graham and Bill "I once blamed Obamacare for the opioid epidemic, no, seriously" Cassidy.

The general gist of Graham-Cassidy is that it takes the money raised by Obamacare's taxes (many of which would remain in place) and redistributes it to states in the form of block grants. At that point the argument they would make is that states that want Obamacare could keep systems resembling that and the ones that don't wouldn't have to. But here's the problem. First, the money this bill would provide states (especially without the individual mandate, which this would kill) is not enough to keep the markets where they are right now. You'd see increased premiums and decreases in coverage. Additionally, it would end federal protections for pre-existing conditions, so if your state wants to deregulate health care, insurance companies could once again fuck people over for the terrible sin of "not always having been healthy." It hasn't been scored by the CBO yet, but it's safe to say that it would lead to millions and millions of more uninsured people and allow insurers to charge sick people more for coverage.

Now it's been a few weeks, so a quick reminder, the GOP can only afford two defections on the bill. Three "no's" means the bill dies. Already Rand Paul has said that he's a "no," because the bill doesn't go far enough to repeal Obamacare, but we've heard that before and he came around last time. So the question becomes, what do the three senators who killed the last bill (Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski, and John McCain) do. That's still to be seen, but a bad sign for those of us who were delighted to see Obamacare saved last time, is that Republicans seem to be rallying around this bill and Lindsay Graham is going on the offensive. Going on Breitbart Radio and telling an audience that usually hates him to call and demand a vote. Other so-called "moderate" Republicans are backing the proposal.

Now Susan Collins is expected to be a "no" again. But what of Murkowski and McCain? Murkowski faced a lot of blowback from Alaskan conservatives for her vote to oppose the last Obamacare repeal, but at the same time received glowing press coverage and did glossy sit-downs with national media along with Senator Collins. The question is which landed with her more? (I'm personally betting on the national praise. Please, please be the national praise.) And then we have John McCain who played with our emotions last go around only to deliver the knockout blow in the most dramatic way possible. Even though he is good friends with Graham, would he want to undo all that goodwill so quickly?

On September 30th, the Senate won't be able to pass it because after that they will a full 60, and not just the simple majority that reconciliation provides. So if you're the calling type, now would be a good time to make some calls.